Trump Left Off White House Attendee List for Jerusalem Embassy Opening
Though the U.S. president had previously said he 'may' attend the ceremony, it appears unlikely that he will take part
WASHINGTON - The White House released a statement on Monday about the delegation it will send to next week's ceremony in honor of the U.S. Embassy's relocation to Jerusalem. Based on the statment, it apppears unlikely that Trump himself will attend the ceremony.
According to the statement, the administration will be represented by a group of senior officials, including Ivanka Trump, the president's daughter, and her husband Jared, a senior adviser to the president.
Other participants, the statement said, will include Secretary of the Treasury Steve Mnuchin, Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan, and Jason Greenblatt, Trump's special envoy to the Middle East peace process.
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Trump said last month that he "may go" to the ceremony celebrating the opening of the American embassy, and bragged about saving money by rejecting an initial proposal to devote $1 billion for the construction of a new embassy, and replacing it with a significantly more moderate plan costing close to $400,000 instead.
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The current American plan is to announce the existing consular building in southern Jerusalem as the embassy's location, and move only a small number of offices from the embassy in Tel Aviv to that building as an initial step.
The larger step of moving the entire embassy to a new location in Jerusalem would cost more than the sum Trump mentioned, and would also take more time. Trump's former Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, announced last year that constructing a new embassy in Jerusalem would take years, and probably won't be done within Trump's first term in office.